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37:06
SPEAKERS
(voiceover), Geoff Moore, Diane Byrne
(voiceover) 00:01
Welcome to Megayacht News Radio, the first and longest running podcast series dedicated to the large yacht industry, hosted by Diane Byrne, the editor of megayachtnews.com. We feature conversations with engaging and inspiring people in yachting from shipyard CEOs, to designers, from yacht managers, to young entrepreneurs. And yes, even owners. You’ll learn how they got into yachting, how they’re building better businesses, and especially how they’re helping people like you get more enjoyment out of the yachting lifestyle.
Diane Byrne 00:52
Welcome, everyone. Today, my guest is Geoff Moore, the managing director of West Nautical, which sells charters and manages a variety of superyachts from its head office in the UK, plus has a team and additional offices around the world. Besides doing a lot as a small team, though, and why Geoff is here to talk today, West nautical is really striving to educate buyers, owners and charters. In fact, the staff regularly posts original articles on their website, diving clients through their options, rather than simply posting generic itineraries or sales listings that they’ve just completed. I’ve had a number of conversations with West nautical staff about this original content approach, since it is exactly what we do at mega yacht news. So what better to do than to educate you all about it? And with that, Geoff, welcome to Megayacht News Radio.
Geoff Moore 01:49
Thank you very much. What a wonderful introduction.
Diane Byrne 01:52
Oh, you’re very welcome. I you know, I really do mean it. I think it’s great what you guys are doing in terms of really trying to educate people. And you know, we’ll really dive into that in a couple of minutes. First, though, what I’d love to do is get your background, because I find so many people are in our industry because they grew up boating or they grew up sailing. So what’s your story?
Geoff Moore 02:14
It would be very easy to say, “well, I grew up boating,” wouldn’t it? Well, I did technically, it all started when I was I think about eight years old. And my parents rented a little house in the east of England and it had an open day boat. So no roof just a tiller outboard on the back on a river so not even on the sea. And every day we spent as a family of four in the boat, and it was the wettest August known to humankind. But still everyday we spent in it. And at the end of that holiday, my parents bought a little 22 foot riverboat. And in two years later, they upgraded to a 26 foot which they still own now. And my sister was getting bored. So they bought her a little topper sailing boat, and I was getting bored. So I got a little 2.4 meter inflatable boat with a two horsepower outboard. And it would be very traditional. We would look in the map in the morning and say we’re going to be there tonight. Off you go. And we will just disappear off down the river. And then when I was 16, my sister left home and became a yacht master. Sailing, she was very much sailing I was very much motor. We couldn’t be more separate about that. And my sister sent me information from the college about the merchant navy. So when I was 18, I joined the merchant navy. And I am now a class one master Mariner. So I worked on commercial ships for a long, long time. And I actually fell into the super yacht. He didn’t know what super yachting was, I was very commercial was on cruise ships, and ferries and dredges and big commercial ships. And an officer I’d worked with many years before, who had not heard from since I gave him my email address about five years before, sent me an email saying send me your CV on pain of death. So I thought well, I better send in my CV. And he was actually the chief officer on rising sun, which at the time was the world’s largest yacht. And I interviewed and I got a position there a second officer. This is now back in 2007. And that’s how I sort of fell into the superyacht sector. So I worked on board mega yachts, I worked in Ward seven in total, up to the largest was rising sun but I worked on the last two years as chief officer on Luna and Dolores in the Abramovich fleet. And I worked on various numbers from 50 meters, 60 meters 70 meters upwards, up to pretty much mainly chief officer but also his relief captain. And then I moved to short quite a long time ago now, about 10 years ago, my son’s just turned 10. So it must have been about 10 years ago that I moved to shore and I sort of never moved, never looked back. I don’t miss to see I’ve moved into management which was sort of my forte and that’s been very much my background for a number of years as management because I know the operational side, inside out from being on board and then from that other given the opportunity to sort of get more into charters more into sales into the marketing, and then, as with most business owners, you don’t actually end up doing what you’re trained to do, you end up running a business. So rather than sort of the ins and outs of running boats now, but that’s very much my background. So it started in a very wet and windy week, on an open boat in the middle of nowhere in England, and it’s turned to this.
Diane Byrne 05:24
Great, great, I love it. It’s a terrific story. I absolutely love it. Especially that was the wettest August, probably in the history of mankind, right?
Geoff Moore 05:34
I’ve got my, my parents are quite lean, and they don’t, they don’t spend money ever. And that’s why we got so wet. We got somewhere which we have no idea we found a road and just caught a taxi. Because it would that I think even our bones were wet. It was oh, we obviously loved it because we ended up buying a boat. So yeah,
Diane Byrne 05:51
Well, when you’re a little kid, too, it doesn’t really matter. I think sometimes how wet or cold you are, you’re still having a blast the entire time, right?
Geoff Moore 06:00
I think to a point to a certain point when hypothermia sets in, and then you’re like, Okay, now this is no longer.
Diane Byrne 06:06
Good point. Right? Well, definitely drier days have followed for sure. So let’s talk about the, the activity that’s gone on over this past year. We as an industry have certainly seen a tremendous amount of buying and chartering activity. I know your team has certainly had your share of inquiries and sales concluded as well. The The reason I want to talk about this is because I’ve heard some people speculate that all this is about to end, with the world opening up more, people becoming vaccinated, and starting to be able to do some of the things that they used to do before, and I’m wondering if you see an end to this tremendous increase in interest because the world is opening up? Or do you think it’s going to continue?
Geoff Moore 07:00
Well, I think sadly, it has to end, I think the when you, when we look at if we just look at the sales market, as an example, we can see there’s so many yachts that were for sale that sold quite quickly. And there’s a bit of a fire sale with some people as owners really needing to sell or wanting to sell and then other people thought right I get a bargain, then the whole market switched from being a buyers from a seller’s market to a buyers market now, because the buyers, you know, they were the ones really had had the money, they had the cash and they thought they could get a deal. Now there’s so many buyers and not much quality stock left in the industry, because there have been so many sales, it’s now flipped. And it’s more of a seller’s market, where yachts in build are being sold for more money than they were, it’s a bit like the boom days of you know, 2007 2008 before the Big Crunch, where the time is now more important for for owners. And I think that is probably one of the largest effects that COVID has had to a lot of people it’s, you know, COVID is a bit of a field level, you know, it doesn’t matter how much money you’ve got, if you couldn’t travel, if you couldn’t, you know, you couldn’t get a vaccine if you couldn’t, you know, people, friends and families, obviously, tragically passed away from it, and they’d been affected. So it was a big leveler. And they’ve been some very, very large yacht owners who have died from it or have been affected by it quite a lot. And there hasn’t really been a lot in the world that has affected the elite as much as as the non elite, so much as COVID, probably in our generation. And I think the bubble has to burst really because the people that wanted to sell have sold, and the people who wanted to buy have bought or are now in the point where they’ve been distracted by other things. And I think that’s more to the point of rather than the bubble burst. And for yachting, it’s more other distractions have returned. So whereas before it was I can’t get away, but if I bought a boat, I could have got away, which was true. And if they bought one great, they’ve got that distraction. If they haven’t, it’s now are the world’s returning to normal, maybe I don’t need to do that maybe I can look at this, or I can look at that. And there’s there’s other things that are sort of just glimmering of hope for people to look elsewhere. And yachting. The certainly I think showcased in a way that it’s the safety bubble. You know, a lot of advertising was about that. And why not? Because you are there in your bubble, that certainly in the UK, that was the term that we were referencing, you know, to your family and friends, you’re in a little bubble safe and sound. And the yachting is that bubble, especially once you’re on board, a crew, obviously before vaccinations are out there, you know, they were isolating for a couple of weeks before a charter before an owner’s trip. So they were safe. All the stores and consumables that would come on board would be you know, hygienically cleaned and everything. So that would be that would be safe. And it was deemed as a much safer alternative to explore rather than obviously cruise ships, which was the complete opposite spectrum which the whole industry decimated because it was seen as a sort of big COVID hotspots are the potential disaster zone. So whilst I would like to say I don’t think the bubble will burst, I do have to be a bit pragmatic and say, the we’re over the curve now for regards to sales, but it doesn’t mean that it will have a negative knock on effect of charters. In fact, charter inquiries continue to boom, the idea of having a luxury COVID safe holiday. And there is nothing better than dinner superyacht, that’s been widely publicized. And even, you know, the Caribbean season, which has been looking, you know, been on that downturn, really the last few years is now looking up again for this year, and hopefully next year as well. And that can’t be a bad thing. Because yachting has been portrayed in the media initially, quite badly. It always is because it’s elitism. But the the positives of it and the safety element of it, have definitely also had their fair share of of media Limelight, which, which is good, because it does open up to new people that didn’t necessarily think either it was attainable, or that it was worthwhile of the the high price tag.
Diane Byrne 11:09
Right, right. You know, you just mentioned this, this idea of time, family time, especially in the safety bubble. Even post COVID, from where I sit, I think those notions of family time and even the time and desire to escape and discover, are going to be two things that will continue to carry us forward. And I wonder if if you see the same occurring, those two notions seem to me to have been kind of already developing somewhat prior to COVID, but COVID accelerated it. I think there’s a different mindset going on these days. You know, it sounds like you agree.
Geoff Moore 11:51
Definitely, I think what time is the most precious commodity and, and that has been very much sort of, I think shown over all generations of superior owners that I don’t think that’s really changed. But it’s become more highlighted to people who don’t own a super yacht, I use the example that I, I’ve always done. And that’s when you’re face to face with a super yacht owner on board the yacht as a crew member, you know, you get to know that family quite well. And the only time they’re ever together in their busy lives is onboard the yacht for two to four week holiday year. That’s the only time you’ve got the parents, the grandparents, the grandchildren all together the extended family. And that has always been been the case historically, and it continues to be the case, we sold a 57 meter new build very recently, and the owner son was trying to put the owner off the boat, because they used to own one, there’s like, No, we don’t use it, you’re not going to use it just charter blah, blah, blah, the usual sort of stuff, where all the negatives about owning a yacht on a big noose around your neck type thing. And, and, and he turned around in a shipyard meeting and said, No, look, I’m going to retire in three years. And the only time I can see you, your sister, or your children and everyone else is when I invite you to the UN, all of you always come to the UK. And I want to work on my boat as when I live and float around the idealistic dream, because it is that time that time together. And we have to be honest that in today’s world, you know, you’ve got all family members living all over the world, especially in the sort of the elite circles, where the money really flows is that the children are educated, not in the same country in completely different time zones. So they’re moving out where they’re 18 years old, and not coming home, maybe until they’re 2425. And even then there’ll be then married, and then they have children, they’ll settle somewhere else. And they don’t you just don’t have the same family life together that you, you know, traditionally would have done. And with that, that time and spending the time with the people that you want. I think it when it was taken away with COVID and everyone being locked down and you couldn’t see it, zoom was fine. But it’s not the same that we know it’s not the same. That’s why the world is now desperate to see each other face to face again. And that that time and that family element is something that really yachting no matter what the size of the it does bring people together. And it’s a very unique bond of being locked down almost together. Like we’ve all rebelled against, none of us wanted to be locked down. But you always want to be locked down on a boat when five star luxury with with crew with servers with the nice weather, or at least that’s the conception in people’s brains that that’s that’s what they that’s what they want. That’s what they strive for. And if you can financially achieve it, why wouldn’t you?
Diane Byrne 14:37
Yeah, fair enough, fair enough. With that same idea to the activity that people are pursuing when they are chartering, especially, obviously, when they’re owners with their families, too, but I think it’s more a little more prevalent, perhaps with chartering. We’re seeing that the Miata is still a big focus, but it’s really more of the What can I do? What can I see? In the area, what else can I enjoy? It’s not the it is the end all be all. And I’ve noticed with some of the content that your team is putting out, you’re really trying to pique people’s interests in terms of, say, spa holidays, or beach holidays or golfing holidays, things like that. Is that the feedback you’re getting from people when they’re now entering charter for the first time? Or is it a decision from your team? Or you all sat down and said, Okay, let’s give them more notions of what they can do on what the possibilities are.
Geoff Moore 15:35
It’s 50-50. We have some clients who have been there and done it, and what else can I do? What else can I do? You have then some clients who are so new to yachting, but they’re very experienced in other sorts of industries that they then ask the questions. So for example, the customers who were very experienced cruises, but not so experienced in yachting, the cruise holiday is so very different. Because you book, the itinerary, you don’t book the ship, necessarily, you book those dates, and that itinerary. And that’s fixed in stone in the brochure on the website years and years in advance, they know exactly where they’re going to go. They know that in their allotted seven hours in port, they’re going to do this guided to next year, we’re going to come back and do the same. And we’re going to do that guided tour, they’ve only got a finite period of time again, in the pool. And that’s what they want to do. So when those customers come into yachting, they understand the concept of going to one place and going to another place. But what they want to know is what am I going to see when I’m there? Whereas traditionally, we’ll have a lot of customers who go well, I want to go to San Tropez, because I want to be in San Tropez–it’s not, you know, what am I going to do there? Or what historic tour am I going to do? It’s like, I want to sit there for three days, because I know I’ll bump into a lot of friends and I want to go to the beach club. And if that beach club is not available, I know the man or you know the man, and you tiptoe around the right amount of money. And I’ll get into that beach club, that type of customer is still there. And that will always be there. But the people who are, like I said, are coming not necessarily only from cruise ships for more land based holidays, you know, when you’re fixing a hotel for a long period of time, and you go to the concert twice a week and go right? For the next four days. What am I gonna do? Oh, yeah, I can do a helicopter ride and go there. And I can see that vineyard; wonderful, fantastic. I’ll do that then. And the holiday for them is more based out of the hotel or out of the villa. And then what do you see what they explore? And that is now similar to what people are thinking about with the art is, you know, historically, like I said the yacht would be the base, and you know, you’re spending so much money. Why would you eat off when you’ve got this five star luxury chef, and these amazing crew? It would be why would I want to go to a beach restaurant, when I can stay on board in luxury. Whereas different customers and different passengers have different concepts of what they want from their holiday. And some and also also that, of course, depends on the size of the yacht, if it’s, you know, below 40 meters, you can’t expect the crew to be pumping out 345 meals a day for up to 12 out of 12 guests if it’s you know, weeks and weeks on end. Whereas if it’s you know, 40 meter plus, there’s more than enough crew to be doing that there’s when there’s two chefs, you get so much very different standard, of course, food. So we we are in ourselves promoting both sides. Not only of this is the yacht and this is why this cost this much money this is how fantastic the yacht is itself. But it’s also just you know, what you can do with the yacht or beyond the yacht. And now adventure tourism, of course, is one of the buzz phrases at the moment, not only in our sector, but globally. They were there before the pandemic, there was more explore an adventure cruise ships in build than ever before. Because people want to go and see the ice caps before they melt. People want to go to French Polynesia, they want to go to Indonesia and see places that they you know, they see David Attenborough and it looks fantastic. So I want to go there. And people are, you know, thinking a bit more outside the traditional horn. So we’re gonna go to the med for two weeks, in the summer, we’ll go to the Caribbean, and the yacht owners and more probably their children. And so the future should be your own generation, they are thinking about the same. So we’re trying to sort of get ahead herd a curve a little bit and marketing wise and a try and hopefully attract new people into the sector or people who are there, but just give them something else to think about. Like you said, of of what you do off the boat, rather than just this is the boat. This is what you’re going to rent for a week. It’s what you’re gonna do with it.
Diane Byrne 19:31
Yeah, sounds good. So, I would imagine–you’ve somewhat already answered this question–but I’ll I’ll ask it anyway. What do you think we need to do as an industry? What do we need to do better, I should say, as an industry, particularly for these newcomers, whether they’re on the charter side or they’re on the ownership side. The superyacht industry obviously is very different than the smaller production boat. market. But there was a statistic that the National Marine Manufacturers Association here in the United States released not too long ago that really has floored a lot of people. And it’s got a lot of people thinking. It shows that among the first time small boat buyers, a full 42% of them do not stay. So basically, their first boat is their last boat, they sell it and they’re out there out of yachting forever. And it’s for a variety of reasons. And again, we realize small boat buyers and buyers are different to bear buyers tend to be more experienced. But still, I don’t think we can afford literally or figuratively to just sit back and say, Oh, well, you know, they know this lifestyle. This is great, they’re gonna stick with us no matter what, because they love it. So what should we do, to continue to encourage them to stay and kind of stimulate their imagination?
Geoff Moore 20:55
Tell them the truth would always would always be a strong point. And that’s certainly a double edged sword in yachting because the truth is, it costs a lot of money to own a yacht, no matter what the size, because ultimately, the scale of the yacht depends on the owner, the scale of their their own wealth, if they’re looking for a small production boat, or a semi production boat, or then we’re getting beyond the boats, and the yachts, and superyachts, and the mega yachts, and again, yachts and whatever different terms he wants to use, that individual person’s wealth obviously scales up with it, the sheer volume of how many things can go wrong on a on a yacht of all sizes and scales is astronomical. And that’s something we do different at West Nautical, because of my background, and our team has a very strong management based team. And so we are yacht operators. So that’s, you know, when when I have sole jobs, I’m not doing it from a point of view of the, you know, the, the fluff, the razzle dazzle the the sparkly stuff, it’s, you know, the nuts and bolts of, you know, this boat, how much it’s gonna cost. Do you know that every year it needs this doing to it every year, and in doing that to it. And it’s a double edged sword, of course, for selling, because you want to portray it to be wonderful, and fantastic. And that you don’t want to worry them with Juno, that every year and a half you to take it out of the water, you need to antifoul you need to get the generator service, you need to get the engine service, all that boring stuff. But that is what ownership is. You know, and that’s what the the yacht owners, some of them really enjoy. Some of them really don’t know about it. And so if there’s the you know, we can get very angry if you feel that you’ve been mis-sold something, especially if it’s not a new yacht, it’s an older one, there’s no warranty, and go ‘well, hang on, my surveyor didn’t find this. And now you’ve just told me I’ve got this huge bill to pay. Where does that come from?’ Because we’re in such a an antiquated industry, not just from from the brokers and the managers point of view, but from the marinas. And you know, there’s lots and lots of small independent companies rather than very large companies now, and I know that may not be the case in the key hotspots in the States, but certainly in Europe, it can be the case. And in France, Italy, and Spain, where you’ve got, you know, the bulk of the yachts spend their time in Mediterranean, you know, every marine has got, you know, different people you would ask for. And it’s, you know, the white, white van man almost, you know, whoever turns up at the back of the boat, and he’s got some business cards, and oh, you’re good. Well, we use you to do the generators, wherein people can, you know, pay extortionate prices, and the service is not that good. And that that really affects yacht owners when they don’t have massively deep pockets. And it’s not necessarily it’s the financial cost, it’s more, that they feel that they’re being cheated or that they feel that they’re not, you know, they’re not being treated with the respect that they, you know, they should be, which is often the case is true, sadly, to say that, you know, our industry is probably 20 years behind the automobile industry and the and the jet industry with regards to regulation. And, you know, the right people doing the right jobs, because we’re not as regulated as those sectors. And that’s one of the negative points, I guess, for people who are buying their first yacht is if you’re hit with a bad experience, which probably a vast majority of those 42% are, it puts you off, and you go, Well, I liked when it worked, and I was out on the boat, so I just rent one next time. And, and I can’t blame them. And if you want to own a yacht, you have to really want to own a yacht. And that’s through the good times through the bad times. And a lot of people who charted now bought yachts and they have a very good understanding of what they can do with their yacht. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that they understand what the yacht can do to them financially and emotionally speaking, and you know, especially when you’ve got crew you’ve got the human element, which no one really likes to deal with of the crew and when crew of demands or crew leave or there’s, you know, there’s human issues on board with people living their lives separately to you the whole below deck style thing of everything that happens behind the scenes, and, you know, that can also really affect owners that, you know, they might feel that they’re really generous and treating the crew well, and then the crew, you know, start mystery in the owners, and you know, that can really put people off. There’s so many things, so many elements to our, to our wonderful industry that aren’t, or could not be so wonderful. And that I’m not surprised that it puts a lot of people off. And I think the small leisure boat market is, is probably one of the largest hit markets for that. Because if something goes wrong, it’s a very large cost in comparison to the value of the of the boat. And that, you know, that really hits people financially, which, you know, it’s not what you want at all. And the insurance is not the same as with a car or with a house. You know, there’s always some, some caveat there. And I think the vast majority of that time probably comes down to education of the buyer, before he stops being a buyer and starts being an owner. And knowing how much things cost and, you know, distances, times, how long things take to happen. Because you know, we work in a sector where weather is key, if the weather is not good, you’re not going to use your vote. And whether it’s, you know, 20 foot 20 meters, 200 meters. And so when you work very hard your whole life, and you want that boat available for your two to four week holiday in July, if the boats not working at that point, what on earth have you spent the last 11 months working for to have these wonderful assets, which you then can’t use. And it’s all those sort of things that put a bad taste in the mouth of the owners. And unfortunately, you know, statistically, this is it for yourself, they leave the sector, which isn’t good. And so the one thing we have to do, I really think as an industry is educate and be honest. And it is a hard thing, because the same yacht in seven different locations will cost you seven different amounts of money to run. But it’s not too hard as a broker or as a manager or as media to actually explain that to people. If they want to listen to one Listen, that’s their own fault. If you know, the media is obviously the voice of the industry to try and put that across. So really, it’s education and being truthful.
Diane Byrne 27:16
Yeah, very much so. And it’s a that’s also a challenge for a lot of people in the industry. There are conversations that will go off the record with those of us in the media, where a broker, a shipyard rep, a project manager, whoever will say, ‘yeah, this is this is a tough project, you know, it’s a lot of balancing of expectations,’ and really trying to educate the owners and the circles of influence around them. But then on the record, they’re hesitant and even don’t flat out are afraid to say that because they’re afraid that it’s going to turn somebody else off. And I always thought well, why would you be afraid? Because wouldn’t it be better to be upfront that way? Then people say, ‘Oh, yeah, that’s logical. That makes sense. Of course, it’s going to be, you know, impossible to get from island to island in two hours worth of time,’ right or, or something along those lines. And, and yeah, of course, there are systems on board and they have oils that need to be changed and fluids that need to be changed and maintenance that needs to be done on a regular basis and, and regulations that need to be adhered to. So of course those those time periods for the maintenance and for the checks need to be built in. So why not just give them that little tidbit upfront, rather than them be surprised unhappily, later on, when they find out, they can’t have the holiday with the kids that they were looking forward to?
Geoff Moore 28:42
I think a lot of that is actually the people giving them advice don’t know themselves. And that’s certainly a case because there are so many variables involved. And also, of course, it comes down to the dark heart of money. And the brokers selling the money are incentivized, you know, it’s not a paid industry, you know, you’re paid on success. So if the customer doesn’t buy that boat, you’re not going to, you know, get any money for it. And if the customer doesn’t charter the offer, you’re not going to get any money for it. And can you move them on to a better project and more safer financial project? Yes. But then you have to put into the human element of emotions, and design and style and are the captain showed me around that boat when he was quite rude to my wife. So she’s absolutely rolled that boat out the fact that this is perfect in every other way. Doesn’t matter to know. That a whole emotional connection and there’s so many elements to it, that obviously can create an issue, but at the same point, that’s why we do have a successful industry because when those elements align, we have a wonderful person who buys a wonderful yacht and they have a wonderful time on it. So it’s a wonderful, it’s unfortunately when something goes wrong, that’s when you know, that’s the storage talk about we don’t talk about the good stuff. He’s talking about the bad ones and You know, no matter how long you’re in this this industry, you learn every day. And that’s why owners who stick it stick in it obviously, by schreuder, maintain truda. But also depends on their culture. And then it’s not a nationality thing. Certainly it’s an it’s an individual person’s culture, you’ll have an owner of, you know, one yacht and an owner of another sister yacht, those owners have different cultures, and different financial capabilities, or different mentalities on spending their money and those yachts will run completely differently. One will have a full rotational crew, one will have a no rotational single season crew. At the end of the year, one boat will cost one owner more than the other, but there’ll be run to the style that they want. And it’s such a subjective taste, crewing, and you know, maintenance, that there is no black and white. And when it comes to safety, yeah, safety is black and white. And that’s nice and straightforward. But when it comes to aesthetics, and does the yacht need a paint job, they very rarely need a paint job. It’s just the crew and the managers and a lot of owners will want a paint job because it looks better. But if the only goes now I’m happy the way it looks. I know it looks a bit tatty, but it’s fine. And that’s his choice, their choice. And there’s so many subjective variables in our sector. That I do understand when when brokers or or customers are discussing, how much does it cost me to run? It’s very easy to downgrade the number because you don’t want to scare them off. If it’s a generic 40 meter to 50 meter and go ask will cost you a million a year. It’s just a generic number you just thrown out there, a million year. Okay, but that could be less Oh, yeah, it could be less if you use it less. If you feel that, yes, you can go to cheaper ports. If you don’t paint it, the engines work, it could be much less, you don’t then say it could be much more if you use it non stop if the price of fuel goes much higher. If we discover that the generators are on, they’re ours, and they need to be totally overhauled. If your Caterpillar engines need the main engine overhaul, if you need to repaint the boat next year, that’s gonna cost you another 600,000. You don’t say those things in a flippant conversation? Because of course, that’s when the eyes start to bold and go, Well, that was a lot of money. How much does it cost me to paint the boat? You know, and so unless there’s a very deep trusting relationship there between owner or buyer and the broker, or their captain and managers and everyone else involved, it’s very hard to burn, predict and put on the table in advance of the question from the customer. When the customer asked the question, yes, you’ll answer it honestly. But if they don’t ask the question, are you then not doing your due diligence by not telling them that in advance, and that’s a very gray area of of sales, not just in our sector, but in all sales. But that’s probably the one area that we can probably work better on is educating on the lifecycle costs of owning the yachts, because, you know, they go through these cycles of, you know, every five years, the class surveys and everything else. And it’s also the time it’s like, well, it’s gonna take six months to do that what how on earth could take six months. And you know, it’s just this education process. For owners and new owners, it’s, it can be hard for short when they haven’t really understood not only the costs, but the benefits, and you know, what they can do with the art? And I guess, I don’t know how many of that percentages, they get seasick. There’s not a lot we can do if they get seasick, but I’m probably there’s probably one or 2%, in that 42%, and that one of the principal family members have got seasick and Oh, absolutely not going on that again. So they probably sold it. There’s not a lot we can do to that either.
Diane Byrne 33:36
Right now, like you said, education is definitely the way to start. The more that people are educated in anything really, the better off they are. I mean, that’s, that’s what got all of us where we are. And like you said, it’s an ongoing education being in this industry.
Geoff Moore 33:52
Yeah, and one of the things you mentioned was the the fuel costs and the fuel distances and times and one of the things we’ve invested in this year in our website is the fuel cost calculator, which is a very simple interactive map, you can you can do on a tablet, or on a desktop. And you basically click on the different destinations. And it totals up the very quick way of sort of doing a route plan of, of, you know, you’re not as the crow flies, so to speak, but actually following the coastline and tell you the distances and then you can type in the fuel and the speed and things like that. And it gives you some very simple information. Because some people do this, don’t understand that yachts aren’t jets, or they’re not cars or they don’t travel in a direct line and they don’t travel at such huge speeds. And then when you type in what the fuel consumption is of the arts that do do the very high speeds of you know, the 3040 not yachts and massive fuel consumption. That’s when owners really start to go oh my god that’s costing me how much to go for a Monaco to Central Party. That’s absolutely insane. Must go much slower. Okay, but these engines aren’t designed for that. Oh, no one told me that when I bought it Okay, then you’ve bought a yacht, you’re never going to be happy with straightaway. And they are the very small things. But, you know, when you buy on a whim or you buy because of the, the sort of the suggestion of how much pleasure you can have from being on board, that is very true. But if you’re not going to get down and dirty and understand the real lifecycle costs of owning a boat and running a boat, that’s where it can really hit you. And you’ve got to outweigh in your head as a buyer. Will the good stuff outweigh the bad stuff? And clearly for 42% of brand new owners, it doesn’t.
Diane Byrne 35:40
Right, right. Yeah, there’s definitely a variety of reasons why they don’t stick with the, with the lifestyle, but for sure, that education, the lack of education, the lack of weighing all the different aspects is certainly part of it. So I think that’s a very good note to, you know, to end on is something that people need to keep in mind. Thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it. It’s been a great, very frank conversation and one that I’m sure a number of people are going to appreciate.
Geoff Moore 36:12
You very welcome. Thank you for the opportunity.
Diane Byrne 36:14
Everyone. If you’d like to learn more about what Geoff and the West Nautical team are doing, you can visit their website which is westnautical.com. Thanks for listening. Until next time, I’m Diane Byrne.
(voiceover) 36:31
That wraps up this episode of Megayacht News Radio. Thanks for listening. If you like what you hear, please share the word on social media. And subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Audible, IHeartRadio, or Spotify. And of course, to learn more about what’s going on in the world of large yacht cruising, new construction and design, check out our daily updated website, the award winning megayachtnews.com
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